What is Occupational Therapy?

Occupational Therapy? Don’t Know? Don’t worry, most people don’t!

The mysterious profession of Occupational Therapy to be demystified here and now. Well to start, here’s a general description. Occupational therapists help people engage in their daily activities, the fancy word we use to describe activities are occupations. Occupations (items that I specialize in) basically make up everything you do, but here are some examples: Sleeping, bathing, showering, dressing, eating/feeding, grooming, taking care of chores/pets, money management, work skills, and social/play skills.

In short: Occupation = Activity = Stuff you do.

People like me, go to school for a long time to learn how to take the “stuff” you do and break it down into small pieces. There are many many pieces and I am not going to list them all here because I think it would just be more confusing than helpful. Basically, the point of knowing how to break up this “stuff” into small pieces, helps me identify problems people have in a more detailed way. Why is this helpful?

Well, let’s give an example. Let’s say you have been diagnosed with depression. Your depression causes you significant difficulties with finding the motivation to “get your stuff done”. Then the doctor says well maybe you need an occupational therapist. You’re thinking Booo, more providers, well, when I come in, I’m not going to fix your depression. Sorry, I figured I’d give you the bad news first. Instead, I’m going to ask you what do you have trouble with doing on a day to day basis. Oh! Your home tasks like laundry and cleaning seem relentless and drowning. Well, perhaps a solution I could offer would be to create a new laundry routine that still allows you to get the work done but breaks the tasks up into smaller pieces so it’s not as daunting. Sound better? Well, I certainly think so because there are many more ways of doing “stuff” than just one. An occupational therapist like me offer many possible solutions and adaptations to help in this scenario.

So that’s occupational therapy in short. If your brain is not melted yet (because explaining occupational therapy to people melts my brain) and you would like more mind numbing information, check out my Instagram & Facebook pages.